to drown in your mind
by electriques
Summary: She who walks alone in life, is she of sound mind? Of Jean Grey, Charles Xavier, and the tenuous thread that links them.
1. treacherous light that ignites the moon

She comes to him some nights, alone, padding through the dark. He sees her through the crook of his open door: Jean, in her threadbare pyjamas, a sock always in danger of slipping down one of her skinny ankles. Disheveled and bleary eyed. Eyes red not from fatigue — he doesn't need to read her mind for that, it's written on her face — eyes red from the tears she chokes back as she bites so hard into her pillow it tears at the seams.

The pain, the rage, the frustration, the sheer agony. Of powers unable to be sheathed. He knows it all with a suffocating familiarity. And he knows it is this kinship that brings her to him. She knows that he can feel the constant ebb and flow of her powers and emotions, of her pain. He calls out to all her rolling tides from the bridge between their consciousnesses, the shoreline of their meeting minds.

 _Jean, I understand._

 _Jean, don't slip away._

 _Jean, I'm here._

 _I'm here now._

And she is drawn closer to him. Farther from the demons inside her that she keeps at bay.

* * *

She finds comfort in him, and he realizes with a jolt, as he's gazing at her now limp figure curled up at the side of his bed, that it's in a way quite different from anyone else.

There's nothing like being scrutinized by another telepath. Charles is excruciatingly aware of the feeling, almost like being laid bare in front of another person. Naked and defenseless. The more powerful of the two has a little more protection to their name, a little more comfort on the higher ground — usually, that person is him.

But whenever he meets Jean's gaze, meets those piercing blue eyes, he is felled, stunned into submission. And still she seeks solace in the open book, the ruined, crumbling temple of knowledge that he is to her.

As he tucks stray tendrils of her copper hair behind her ear, glinting steely red in the moonlight, his fingers slowly descend and he absentmindedly strokes the nape of her neck, a plane of creamy alabaster. With dark, half-lidded eyes, he follows its path until it eventually disappears into her loose cotton shirt, now having slipped down around her shoulder, leaving it bare. Leaving him with a pang, a quiet roving hunger.

In her sleep, she shivers at the motion. He draws his hand back sharply as if burned.

Eyes wide, he too shivers.

He is more vulnerable now than he has ever been.


	2. une immense espérance a traversé ma peur

So often, she is afraid to go to sleep.

What the night and accompanying fatigue brings her has never truly been consistent. As long as she can remember, she has been greeted with images of joy or death, sometimes both in the same night. She can never trust what dark futures or deep, hidden desires her subconscious will unearth.

She tries to explain it to Scott in their brief, quiet moments of sunlit intimacy, out on the campus green. He lays his head on her stomach and she gazes up at the rays of sunlight peeking through the gnarled old tree, infinitely older than either of them. Jean runs her delicate fingers through his hair, and tries to explain what it's like to see your own mind as an enemy, to hold the contents of her powers together within the fragile container of her sanity, to keep them from spilling over the edges. Beneath all his well wishes and cadences of concern, she knows he does not understand.

Even with him nestled on top of her, she becomes acutely aware then, of just how alone she feels.

The Professor says he understands. _Does he, though?_ She wonders about his infuriatingly earnest expression sometimes, if it belies a truth they both do not want to admit - that she is being torn apart from within and he is but a helpless bystander to it all.

The fact of the matter is though, that no one else could rightfully bear witness to her destruction amongst fire and brimstone.

For what she keeps buried deepest of all, and what inevitably is exhumed the nights when she wakes up with cold, ragged gasps cutting through her lungs like a knife, the nights she _remembers_ her dreams, is that no matter what, Charles Xavier is one of their most prominent features.

He is always there, somehow.

Some nights, she sees him as she descends from the stairs, the cold stones chilling her bare feet. He is standing upright in the anteroom of the mansion, no wheelchair in sight. He is alone; there is not a soul here but he and she. Their eyes meet, and at once they are immersed in an almost deafening silence, somehow louder than the mansion had ever been.

These nights, she approaches him with the limbering grace of a predator. He does not flinch when she touches him, nor when she reaches up and presses her lips to his chastely. To satisfy a curiosity.

Some nights, he is patient and pliant as she opens his mouth with her tongue, dragging it over his incisors and remembering that he is a beast in his own right. But he is still silent and willing as her nails, her claws, (because here in her dreams, she is a bird of prey) rip open his shirt and leave red marks over his bare chest, over his back, as she digs into him as if to never let go. Some nights, he presses her against his desk, even then with a supreme gentleness, and he fills her, in a way Scott never could. To satisfy a hunger.

But some nights she sees herself die in fire and smoke.

She sees herself at the epicenter of carnage and bloodshed, hands raised to the sky, hair wild and untamed, being eaten alive from the inside out, a blood spattered and broken world at her feet. All broken, all dead. Charles is in those dreams, too. Just as in life, in these dreams, he keeps her from isolation.

She kills him in every one of these dreams.

His motionless body lies beside her, his fingers always loosely clasped around her bare ankle, as she burns to death on her own pyre.

Her eternal companion.


	3. to shed some light, the fire must get in

post-x men: apocalypse.

.

Whenever students in any educational institution underwent some sort of shared trauma, it was par for the course to implement some kind of counseling for their needs. Of course, things complicated themselves when the traumatic event in question involved the near-destruction of the world and an attempt on every single one of their lives. In these instances, liberties had to be taken and counseling services had to be...adjusted.

Charles, against Hank's advice, insisted on personally meeting with each one of the students who had accompanied Hank and Raven to Cairo. The idea of raising students in his home and making them soldiers already weighed heavy on his mind. He owed them this much, at least.

Halfway through his personal counseling sessions, Charles could say definitely that it was altogether an...interesting experience. The sessions proceeded as one would expect, considering who he spoke to.

Peter was unassuming and blithe as always - hiding behind a paper-thin veneer of facetiousness that hid an interior of severe insecurity. Verbally, Charles could barely scratch at the surface of his more intimate worries, let alone his deep-seated fears about speaking to Erik, before he launched into a comedic aside about the deplorable video game collection at the mansion, going about a mile a minute.

That session proved to be a well-intentioned, if somewhat futile effort.

.

The new girl, Ororo, was not much better. Charles was infinitely grateful that they could salvage one soul from the destruction Apocalypse left in his wake, but she was reluctant to say much about her experiences. A perusal of her mind gave way to many painful memories, a desolate childhood, and a life fraught by hardship. He gently extricated himself from it and thanked her, watching her walk off. There was a glint of promise in her eyes. She would open up in time.

.

Kurt was easily the most open of the group; eyes the size of dollar coins gazing at him plaintively from across the relatively small space between their two armchairs, turned so that they could face each other. Nearly begging for someone to listen. They spoke about his over-exertion of his powers that day, about his worries about fitting in even in a school full of mutants. About his fear of being exploited for his power, the way he had been all his life. Charles did his best to his allay his fears and concerns, but he knew the look of a hunted animal anywhere. It was always a long process, to unlearn fear.

.

But Scott was worse. Charles could see it in the slump of his shoulders, the pervasive twitches. Even before the Apocalypse event, he'd suffered loss - his brother gone in the blink of an eye. He barely had any time to reel and recover from such a tragedy, and then proceeded to thrust himself into a war zone, nearly dying in the process. No guides to help him through any of it, more blind than he'd ever been. It was a wonder he hadn't collapsed at any point under the stress.

To Charles, it was painfully clear that Scott was shaken from it all; it practically came off of him in waves. But even before he'd joined them, Charles was acutely aware of Scott's tendency to cut himself off from everyone else in situations of high stress. He drew in protectively, lapsed into solitude. Which, Charles gathered from reading him, was happening right then and there - Scott had of as late pushed away all those he had made prior connections to: Jubilee, Kurt, even Jean, his primary companion. He kept to himself now, mainly.

But when gently prodded with suggestions to find solace in the company of others, Scott immediately bit back, sharp and cold and cutting - things about how he should mind his own _damn_ business and how he wouldn't even _be here_ right now if it wasn't _mandatory_ and how he had half a mind to just walk out of the school if he wanted to just so he could get some peace and quiet.

They were both silent for a long time afterward.

Charles' mouth set in a grim line, one of implicit understanding. How many times had he had such conversations with Erik? Insistent calls to join a group and commiserate, ultimately to no avail. Many times, it would push him that much further away. Erik did things on his own terms, by himself; if he returned, he would always do it when he was ready.

He thanked Scott on his way out.

He had to learn from Erik's pain and he had to learn from his past mistakes. Scott deserved that courtesy.

.

His final session.

He didn't know why he'd put her last, he thought suddenly as he gazed down at the cold, clinical typed words circled jaggedly with a red pen:

 _Jean Grey._

At least that's what he told himself. A lie, he thought immediately as Jean lowered herself into the chair, eyes cast downward. Eyes that suddenly shot up and met his gaze, pierced him with their clarity, their sharpness. For the first time, he felt his mind draw back, curling into itself as another presence lingered around its borders.

He was afraid.

(But was it fear? The sensation that made his stomach curdle then, that brought the slightest bit of perspiration to his palms, as he held her gaze?)

 _Hello, Professor._

He could hear her voice reverberate within his skull. Her lips never moved.

Her lips.

Time stopped.

His breath hitched.

At some point that day, amongst the fear and destruction, amongst the carnage and bloodshed, a boundary had been crossed. To conquer greater evils, Charles had beckoned her into his mind, offering her a hand, leading her down the rabbit hole of his psyche.

She had felt the fabric of his inner mind, touched its walls, walked its floors. As he nearly suffocated under the weight of Apocalypse's fist, Charles never realized she went and did what no one else had before.

He'd revealed himself totally to her, all pretenses cast aside, he had been on his knees, dying, and she had lifted him up. Fought off the monsters that nipped at his heels.

Everyone saw that; they saw Jean Grey destroy the greatest evil the world had ever seen. They saw her exorcise him from Charles Xavier like a demon.

But what everyone else didn't see was after she cast out the devil in his mind, it left just the two of them there. In the seconds between death and life, between the stilling of his heart and the touch of her hand on his cheek that filled air back into his lungs, it was only the two of them in the wide expanses of his mind. One kneeling, one standing in that empty hallway.

She had stooped down then, in those seconds that felt like hours, and pressed a kiss to his bleeding lips.

At that moment, the world seemed to tilt and collapse, blues turning to reds, his vision blurring. After that moment, it was all sensation, the taste of her tongue, the searing heat of her lips, a blinding pain, the distant screams of a man - was it him? The last image he saw before he woke, the last image seared into his memory, was Jean Grey licking his blood off her lips. The last thing he felt was the accompanying sick thrill before he lurched back into the realm of the living.

(So was it fear he felt, now?

No.

No, it wasn't.

It was anticipation.)

 _Hello, Jean._


	4. a night so black the darkness hummed

"How are you feeling?"

 _You know how I'm feeling._

The immediacy of the shared thought, sudden and unannounced, nearly made him wince. Borders between them had already been crossed. She had as much access to his mind as he did anyone else's. To shut her out — or at least try to, since he wasn't even sure he _could_ — would be hypocritical.

 _You were there. You saw me._

Her brow was furrowed, her jaw set. Her stare was hard, unyielding. But he smiled, not unkindly.

 _Yes, but I want to know how you're doing now. How have things changed for you?_

Her eyes flashed dangerously. His teeth clamped down on his tongue sharply at his thoughtlessness. Charles almost instantly regretted asking her so bluntly.

But the tremors in her voice that echoed within his mind showed him that perhaps, she was not _so_ different from before. Still the unsure girl who sought his company and his counsel under the cover of the night.

 _The dreams are...worse,_ the voice said. He grimaced, a sympathetic twist of his mouth.

A long pause.

He couldn't read her, he realized as he tried to peer into her mind, the shock of the realization twisting in his gut like a knife. _Why couldn't he read her?_

She had shut him out at every opening.

She tilted her head, eyes still on him, wearing an unfathomable expression. A older, practiced expression on a young face. An eerie thought struck him as he stared at her numbly: it was almost like looking in a mirror.

 _But some of those dreams are different_ , said the voice abruptly.

Everything seemed to still in the moments that followed, as if all was encased in amber. He watched with a morbid fascination, the hyper-slowed flutter of her bronze eyelashes, the imperceptible rise and fall of her chest. Her words amplified tenfold the cold fear that swept over him, over his sheer lack of control.

He remembers a time when she was soft, tender, untrained, her thoughts bleeding out of her like an open wound. Now her mind is sharp like a blade and she commands his attention.

(The teacher becomes the pupil? No. The hunter becomes the hunted.)

 _I dream_ , she continued, maintaining her gaze, fixed upon him.

 _I dream about touching you. About feeling your hands on my body._

Charles inhaled sharply, his heartbeat thrumming in his ears, a frantic staccato.

 _I dream about kissing you and I wake up with the taste of blood in my mouth._

Red hair. Red mouth. Red bird of fire. He could see it in his mind's eye.

He saw the flickering look in her eyes then and he recognized it. Hunger. Fear. Need. A singular, all-consuming, childlike fascination with another creature so similar to yourself and yet so incredibly _different_.

He knew it because he himself had felt it, buried it in the deep recesses of his mind. Hadn't dared to speak it aloud.

 _Jean, I—_

 _That was real, wasn't it?_

 _I touched you then, did you feel it?_ Her thoughtspeak, initially excited, became frenzied and insistent; she practically buzzed with energy, her hands curling around the edge of her armrests, nails digging into the fabric so viciously it nearly teared.

He didn't dare to breathe.

 _Yes. Yes, Jean. I did feel it—_

 _Why didn't you say—do—?_

Charles shut his eyes, fingers massaging his temple, lips tightened around his gritted teeth.

 _What would you want me to do?_ he thought exasperatedly, looking to her as he pressed down on the darker parts of his thoughts with his heel. _What would you have me do, Jean?_

 _Something like this._

In a millisecond, she threw up a spiral of repeating interactions between the two of them as a shield, an illusion for the sake of anyone who came in. In the next, she had closed the distance between them and was standing over him, eyes gleaming. All of a sudden, he was filled with a sickening sense of familiarity.

She hesitated for a moment, the shy diffidence of old bleeding through. Despite the situation, he smiled at the minute innocence of it.

After a moment's deliberation, she raised her hand, drawing the knuckles of her fingers down his cheekbone with a painstaking gentleness.

He shuddered at her touch, exhaled softly as he leaned into it against his better judgment.

 _I've felt—I—I want—_

Her words hung alone in the silence.

Her hand stayed where it was.

His eyes shuttered closed.

.

He is still, heartbeat slowed to a barely distinguishable rhythm.

The wise man meditating.

Deliberating.

In the vast emptiness of his mind, he can feel her.

For years, the solitude of his inner mind proved its worth time and time again. To escape the cacophony of voices, he could retreat within it, seeking its tranquility. But with the quietude always came the loneliness. He had always thought it his destiny to oscillate between navigating the seas of others' overwhelming emotions, only to inevitably drown in them, or to fall back into himself and suffocate within the claustrophobic contents of his own mind.

It had always been the clamor or the isolation.

Until —

 _(I've felt—)_

He can hear her whispers in the dark, murmurs of her half-fulfilled prophecies. The hum of her raw power, the crackle of her electricity, a bursting livewire caught betweens his hands. It calls to him. His feet begin to move on their own.

She draws him to her as if he were following a thread through a maze.

 _You read that to us, didn't you, Professor?_

 _How did that story end, again?_ she asks, her voice echoing through the empty hallways as he descends further into the dark.

 _Man consumes the monster,_ he answers, with the patience of a teacher and the hunger of a man.

 _Man becomes the monster._

It is pitch black here, but muscle memory tells him he knows where he is. She is sprawled on the floor of his bedroom.

His long, pale fingers reach out, so often splayed across his forehead, now settling down, down, to worship at a different temple. Their fingertips meet in the darkness. She grasps his hands and draws him in, pulls him to the ground. He feels her before he can see her, his fingers on her bare knees, his palms grasping at the soft flesh of her thighs. The danger of it scalds him, leaves him breathless, and he is sure is burning.

He is sure he is being set aflame from the inside out.

But he wants.

He wants her before he can see her.

 _(I want.)_

His hands travel across the planes of her bare skin, poring over her body like sacred texts. She is so capable of violence, of destruction, but _to him_. To him, she will always feel as delicate as the wing of a hummingbird and infinitely more precious. Even as every caress of her skin sets his blood on fire.

His fingers trace the curve of her breast, thumbing the areola before pinching it gently. He hears her gasp quietly and something in him snaps.

He wants it in between his teeth.

Her breath is hot and heavy on his neck, the rising smoke of a flame. His body cries out for mercy, as if he has touched her for too long, and she is a creature too strong, too brilliant, for him to bear. But he does not yield; he shall let the flesh burn.

He stays by her side. In the scorching heat, there is a kindred spirit. Outside of it, there is nothing.

The tendrils of her hair illuminate them, glowing like embers in the darkness. She is a burst of light now, and he is catching fire. He feels her hands clasp his face, his fingers dig into her hips reflexively as her lips meet his and scorch him once more, and _oh_ , how he _revels_ in it.

He cannot stand in the path of a forest fire and impede its progress. He will guide it and let it have its way with him; perhaps he can make a home within it.

Nature takes its due course, and fire consumes, cleanses, births, and re-births. Fire takes what it wants.

 _(I want.)_

 _._

His eyes flutter open to see Jean still standing above him, two spots of color high on her cheeks. He watches as a bead of sweat forms at her temple.

He watches it as it trickles down her neck.

He exhales hard through his nose.

He looks up at her for a long moment before taking her hand, still at his face, and pulling her down gently until she is at eye-level.

 _(_ _ **I**_ _ **want**_ _.)_

 _You want?_

He tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear and she shudders with sudden recognition, before he leans forward. Before he leans forward and whispers into the shell of her ear, "So then, _take_."

He will be the match if she is the flame. All he can do is burn with her.

For the second time, he beckons her down the rabbit hole.


End file.
